The Toronto Craptors: They're called "motions," and the Craptors are going through them. Remember, it was less than a month ago that Chris Bosh tried to light a fire under his team by "mixing it up" with Brian Cardinal, after which Bosh said: "You have to realize nice guys sit at home and watch the playoffs. That's just how I feel, maybe I'm wrong. But if you play with intensity you're more likely to win, and you're more likely to play better basketball." Sadly, Brian Cardinal still plays for only one team -- last time I checked, anyway -- so inspiration has been hard to find. Like last night in Charlotte, for example, where the Craptors shot 38 percent and committed 24 turnovers (giving up 28 points in the process).

So here are some quick Craptor facts: First, they have lost six straight and nine of their last 10 road games. Second, they fell to 16-35 since Jay Triano took over as head coach. (Sam Mitchell, for the record, was 8-9. So, you know, maybe he wasn't the problem after all.) Third, a year after going 41-41 and finishing 6th in the Eastern Conference, they have already lost 44 games and are currently 14th in the East...30 games back of the first-place Crabs.

Jay Triano, Captain Obvious: "We just seemed to lack a lot of zip from the opening tip tonight." Well no sh*t, coach.

Marcus Banks:From the Toronto Star: "Marcus Banks is likely done for the year. Obtained in the Shawn Marion-Jermaine O'Neal trade less than a month ago, Banks is going to get some time off because of a nagging toe injury. Banks appeared in six games for a total of 40 minutes with Toronto and did not accompany the team to Charlotte for last night's game. There are no plans to replace him."

The Memphis Grizzlies: A day after halting their latest fail streak with a stunning win at Detroit, the Griz returned home and began a fresh, new skid by slipping on a few well-placed banana peels coming out of the gate. From the AP recap: "Portland built an early double-digit lead hitting nine of its first 10 shots in the game. When the Trail Blazers finally missed their second shot, it only delayed the scoring as Przybilla grabbed the offensive rebound for a dunk. The sequence dropped Portland's shooting to 83 percent."

To their credit, the Baby Bears clawed their way back into the game and got to within striking distance in the fourth, but, much like the Clippers, they are who we thought they were. And that is a team that will probably lose about 60 games by the time everything is said and done.

Darko Milicic: Okay. We all know when and where he was drafted, as well as the players who got drafted after him (one of whom leads the league in scoring and dropped 50 on the Jazz last Saturday). So I'm not going to go into all that again. What I am going to mention is his line from last night's game: 2 points (0-for-2), zero rebounds and 1 personal foul in one minute, 20 seconds worth of daylight. Okay, seriously, this isn't Bowie over Jordan, but it's pretty damn close, right? Update! From Andrei: "Just a quick addition to the Milicic bawfulness. The guy didn't get any PT last night because within a minute of being in the game he streaked to the hoop on a fast break and then strained his back on the lay-up attempt without being touched. He of course missed the lay-up as well."

The San Antonio Spurs: When you're the Spurs, and you hold your opponent to 78 points on 35 percent shooting and that opponent is the Thunder (19-48), you're supposed to WIN the game, right? I mean, San Antonio went up by 17 points in the first 10 minutes. But this is the NBA, where they continue to play four full quarters of basketball no matter how much one of the teams is behind. And you know what they say: Everybody makes a run. Gregg Popovich -- who was denied victory his 1,000th game as Spurs coach -- said: "Oftentimes, it's a coach's worst nightmare. We've all had the leads. We've all lost them because it's a game. It's 48 minutes long. There are a lot of possessions. It can happen and it does happen often. It's called basketball. It's a basketball game. It happens all the time." Yes, my friends. It's called basketball. That is why Gregg is a coaching genius.

Tony Parker and Tim Duncan: Sometimes superstars giveth, and sometimes they taketh away. Last night Parker (28 points, 7 assists) and Duncan (14 points, 12 boards) did a little of both. TP and TD combined for 7 turnovers in the second quarter, which helped field the 17-2 run that the Thunder used to get back into the game. The two of them finished with 9 TOs (5 for Tony and 4 for Tim). The Thunder, as a team, finished with 11.

The New Orleans Hornets: From super hot to super cold just like that. The Hornets had won six of eight games this month before getting hammered by the Bulls in Chicago on Saturday night. But things looked pretty good for them heading into a home matchup with the Yao Ming-less (flu-like symptoms!) Rockets. But a funny thing happened on their way to an easy win: Houston turned the tables on New Orleans, beating them by 11 points behind Luis Scola (14 points, 12 rebounds) and Ron Artest (18 points). Chris Paul was his usual spectacular self -- 29 points, 6 rebounds, 11 assists, 6 steals -- but he didn't get a lot of support from his 'mates. David West managed only 16 points (on 17 shots), Tyson Chandler fouled out with 4 points (2-for-5) and barely managed to snare more rebounds (7) than Paul. Guess we need to retract all those "The Hornets Are Starting To Assert Themselves" articles that were running a week or so ago.

Julian Wright: He finished with as many field goals (3) as blocked shots against, each of which was sent back by Dikembe Mutumbo, who at this point would make a mummy look healthy and youthful. And since I can't find any of those swats on YouTube yet, here's some bonus 'bawful from Julian's college days...

Dikembe Mutombo, quote machine: It's amazing this guy is still playing basketball. Seriously, there are "Dikembo is so old..." jokes that are older than half the guys in the league. But that didn't stop him from blocking shots and grabbing almost as many rebounds (6) in 24 minutes as Tyson Chandler nabbed in 37 minutes. And you'd better believe that finger was wagging when he returned Julian Wright's shots to sender. But Deke wasn't trying to hotdog or anything. He was trying to survive. "I've got to stop and take a breath. I'm old. I don't need to be running up and down." I guess sense of humor is one of the last things to go.

Ron Artest: Yes, he scored a team-high 18 points...on 23 shots. In point of fact, Ron-Ron missed his first 11 shots, 9 in the first half, and bonked on all 9 of his three-point attempts. That, dear readers, is textbook SWAC-ism.

And here's some bonus megalomania from Artest: "There's nobody at my position that can keep me from getting to the basket, so I have to keep that in mind." File that away with that time Ron described LeBron James as a "new and improved version of myself."

The New Jersey Nets: Giving up 38-point fourth quarter en route to a 25-point loss was bad enough, but it dropped the Nets to 12th in the Eastern Conference. They now trail the Bucks, Bulls Bobcats and even the Knicks in the (rather pathetic) battle for the East's eighth sacrificial lamb playoff spot. And now it's time for the update -- the Nets are 17-31 since Devin Harris said: "We knew we were going to be a playoff team."

Believe it or not, the Nets outshot the Nuggets 49 percent to 45. So what happened? They were murdalized on the boards (51-31) and gave up a mind-boggling 25 offensive rebounds. No, really, my mind is boggled. Chris Andersen had more offensive boards by himself (8) than anybody on the Nets had total (Brook Lopez "led" New Jersey with 6 rebounds). I understand that the Nets were missing Devin Harris, but I doubt he would have solved their problems on the boards.

Sean Williams: In addition to missing Harris, the Nets were without Williams, who was "arrested Monday at a cell phone store in a mall in suburban Denver on accusations he got into an argument with a clerk and threw a computer monitor." Oh yes he did. The monitor was broken and a printer and signature pad were damaged at a cost of between $1,200 to $1,300. Mind you, Williams was arrested on February 15th for violating a no trespass order at Boston College, from which "he had been barred in May for reasons that BDD has declined to publically release." I have a feeling this guy isn't long for the NBA.

Lacktion report: Give me back that Filet of Chris, Gimme that Chris! (Sorry. I'm mildly obsessed with this McDonald's commercial.)

Raptors-Bobcats: With Jake Voskuhl forced to leave his warmups on tonight, the newest member of the Little Three of Lacktivity, Patrick O'Bryant, stepped on for the Craptors and delivered a suck differential of +2 in 2:52 via brick and foul, also noted as a Madsen-level 1:0 Voskuhl!

Charlotte's Nazr Mohammed did make a field goal, but a lack of rebounds led to a 4:2 Voskuhl via three fouls and a giveaway in 3:06.

Spurs-Thunder: Bruce Bowen's recent resurgence in lacktivity continues with a one-foul +1 in 3:59 for Gregg Popovich's squad. Apparently this was how Popovich wanted to celebrate his 1000th game as coach, by putting Bowen back into his vintage role -- instead of actually, you know, trying to beat Klahma!?

Blazers-Grizzlies: Darius Miles definitely learned well from his early days under Donald Sterling's tutelage, as he managed to score exactly one trillion (at least by Yahoo's boxscore) for the Tennessee-based bear cubs! (According to ESPN, this acquisition of wealth never occurred.)

Mr. Bawful, actually Popovich was coaching in his 1000th game for the Spurs, he wasn't seeking his 1000th win, but that actually kinda makes the loss worse. When he is sitting on 999 wins he'll be able to try to reach that milestone in the next game, but he'll never coach his 1000th game again. Whatever, it's an awful win just for losing to the Thunder.

Ron Artest is such a disaster. How could the Hornets have lost that game with Artest shooting at such an inefficient rate with that many shots? I wonder if Chris Paul is regretting having signed that contract with the Hornets a year ago.

I missed your reminder of Devin Harris' playoff quote yesterday following the Nets' loss to the Clippers, so I'm glad to see you got to post it today following their loss to the Nuggets. To me that quote is up there with Tracy McGrady saying it felt good to be in the second round of the playoffs.

Screw you so hard, Bawful. I was actually planning on having a productive day at work today. Now I will be singing as many parodies of "Give me back that filet o fish" as possible, as it is permanently stuck in my head.

Also, cheers to the return of the passive-simplistic Kobe comments. Screw the haters, these were always the best (and the Terry Tate ones, obviously).

I don't think anyone should be surprised about Sean Williams. I remember Bill Simmons wrote this about him (Nov 2007):

"From what I've seen so far, Williams is clearly the most talented rookie other than Kevin Durant, Al Horford and Greg Oden (in absentia). He's a game-changer. He's also someone who had the most character red flags of any potential lottery pick since Eddie Griffin … and, um, Eddie Griffin is dead. There's no way anyone can predict how this could play out. I could see Williams averaging a double-double from December through April. I could see him failing a drug test (like he did back in college in 2005) even as I'm typing this paragraph. I could see him getting a triple-double with points, rebounds and blocks. I could see him showing up on Season 5 of "The Wire" and shooting Snoop or Marlo. I am prepared for ANYTHING from the Sean Williams Era. But at long as he's getting minutes and staying out of trouble, the Nets are a top-six team in the East whether Vince Carter is interested or not."

I guess Devin Harris could blame Williams for them not being a playoff team...

Just a quick addition to the Milicic bawfulness. The guy didn't get any PT last night because within a minute of being in the game he streaked to the hoop on a fast break and then strained his back on the lay-up attempt without being touched. He of course missed the lay-up as well.

In some way, drafting Milicic was worse than drafting Bowie. For one, Bowie was actually a half-way decent player. Milicic is just straight up bawful.

And while Bowie was selected over Jordan, in some ways not selecting Wade, Melo, Bosh, etc. in a draft so loaded with future All-Stars is even more egregious. It's like putting your hand into a sack of diamonds and pulling out a turd.

So wait, Walsh is comparing Gallinari's package to Larry Bird's package, or to Larry Bird himself?! If Gallinari's package is comparable to Larry Bird in his entirety, then Gallinari must have a hell of a lot of trick shots up his sleeve (or elsewhere).

The jury's still out on the Bowie vs. Milicic comparisons. Bowie might have been a better individual player than Darko is, but the bottom line is that after that draft Chicago won 6 titles with Jordan while Portland won none with Bowie (or anyone else). Meanwhile, Darko has one ring, while Wade, Bosh, Amare et al have one ring combined. So as of now anyway, I'd have to say drafting Bowie was the worse decision.

Bawful: Nice link to Royalty there and that letter to Simmons. Really, I've felt that it's not so much the bad economy (though that certainly is a factor) as the cold reality that the Maloofs no longer seem to care about the average fan, the "crap, we really have a potato suck race contestant in purple this year" ticket price decrease notwithstanding. The run to bawfulness came just as they demanded that taxpayers cover a downtown arena, in a city in which several notorious crime hotspots (Del Paso Heights! The Meadowview!) still need to be addressed badly.

Interestingly, the whole suggestion of the Kings moving back to a market where the Association failed sounds like...what happened two-three years ago when the Pittsburgh Penguins threatened to move there, before getting a new arena deal. Yeah, the Kings lasted about 4-5 more years than the KC hockey team (the Scouts) but both Kemper Arena tenants were terrible and unremarkable, save for the one playoff year the Kings had. Having a new arena there doesn't make it a viable market on its own, any more than the then-new digs in '74 made it a good place for arena sports.

In the original "SWAC" post, you said: "A SWAC must be someone who cannot shoot (though, by the law of averages, he will occasionally hit a shot or two) but insists on shooting nearly every time he touches the ball."

Note this section of my comments from your SWAC WOTD post:

"Also, it is important to distinguish between a SWAC (Shooter Without a Conscience) and a player who is SWAC (Shooting Without a Conscience). And, you pretty much did that by explaining the conditions under which someone may be called 'a SWAC.'

However, I would - generally - consider Ron Artest to be a bit of a SWAC (or, at least, capable of morphing into one at any moment a la Bruce Banner "...you wouldn't like me when I'm shooting..."). But, he doesn't quite fit in your description of a SWAC, or your description of SWAC-like players who are not offical SWACs. Maybe, just maybe, he's his own man - uncategorizable. After all, he is completely insane."

If Ron Artest is a textbook SWAC, how do you account for his occassional (okay, RARE) nights with good FG%?

Ok i have to come in here to defend Bowie. Of course the players in that draft ended out much better but think about it for a second. No one could have predicted that Jordan was gonna be that good. He barely averaged 20pts a game in college and even more rediculous is predicting that a player would get a team that many rings. Another thing is that Bowie had numbers that Darko cant even dream of attaining and Bowie did it against players that were actually good. Im pretty sure that if Bowie came into the NBA now instead of back then he would get more than 10 and 7. Especially if he wasnt so injury prone.

can i get a mention on the WOTN for all those criticizing Charlie Villanueva for twittering ?

I mean really ... how is that different from speaking to a teammate about no matter what or taking a piss ? He took 2 fuckin' minutes to text a message.

It's not like he wasn't listening to coach Skiles. He did listen and he also ACTED on what he was being told. He took it upon himself to play better in the 2nd half. He said "I gotta step up" and he actually did it. And his team won.

If I was Skiles, I'd tell him to twitter things like "I'm gonna pull down 20 boards tonight" or "I'll block 10 shots" before every game. Whatever gets him motivated. Don't you wish McGrady would have twittered "I'll get to the 2nd round and not piss my talent away" about 5-6 years ago ?

BTW, last night Kobe twittered: "I won't pick on Luke Walton anymore". Then he waited about 2 minutes, watched as Luke read the twitter (Kobe made him subscribe) and got tears of joy on his face, then smacked him hard on the head and said: psych, fool !!!